


Jeeves and the British Government

by VTsuion



Series: The Mysterious Mr. Jeeves [10]
Category: Jeeves & Wooster, Jeeves - P. G. Wodehouse, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Drama & Romance, Dysfunctional Family, Established Relationship, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Meet the Family, Pre-World War I, Protectiveness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-05
Updated: 2020-12-05
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:07:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27900514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VTsuion/pseuds/VTsuion
Summary: Mycroft Holmes delivers a dire warning, and Bertie Wooster must decide between valet, king, and country.
Relationships: Reginald Jeeves/Bertram "Bertie" Wooster
Series: The Mysterious Mr. Jeeves [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1860103
Comments: 18
Kudos: 28





	Jeeves and the British Government

There was an east wind blowing across London - or perhaps easterly is a better word for it - not just across London, but across England, and all of Europe, really. But as far as Bertram Wooster was aware on that particular afternoon, it could have been perfectly still, without a breeze stirring or a cloud in the sky. I have often noted that just when all seems to be well in the world and things have just about reached their peak, something springs from rather out of nowhere, just to remind me that life doesn’t always have to be sunshine and roses. I’d always thought of it as a personal rule, but I have since wondered if it doesn’t apply to nations as well.

As far as I was concerned, however, it seemed a perfectly pleasant, sunny afternoon. The windows were open to let in a gentle breeze, and I had settled on the sofa with an old favorite, with some inkling in mind of heading to the Drones when evening rolled around. I had not gotten so far as informing Jeeves - hard at work in his lair, no doubt - when there was a knock at the door.

I glanced up, but I could have sworn I didn’t see Jeeves pass through the sitting room, before, just a moment later, I heard the front door swing open.

“Jeeves, just the man I wanted to see” - a deep, muffled voice sounded in the hall.

Jeeves made some reply, but I couldn’t quite make out the words.

There was a bit of a back and forth and I had just made up my mind to stand and see what it was all about, but hadn’t quite gotten around to the actual standing bit, when Jeeves materialized in the sitting room.

“Mr. Mycroft Holmes,” he announced, as if the chap had only just arrived.

I leaped to my feet as though struck by a pin.

Mr. Holmes, for his part, didn’t so much materialize as lumber into the room.

At this point some clarification may be warranted. You see, the appearance, as it were, of Mycroft Holmes wasn’t entirely such an unfathomable occurrence as may be expected. As it turns out, these brainy coves are all acquainted. In fact, Sherlock Holmes is something of an uncle to my own Jeeves, and I had happened to meet him some years ago. His pal Dr. Watson had even taken something of a shine to old Bertram. But I had hardly heard of Mycroft Holmes outside of Dr. Watson’s writings.

As for Mycroft Holmes, there was about as much of the chap as one might expect. He stopped just shy of the door and examined me with those legendary sharp, pale grey eyes, no doubt subjecting Bertram W. to the highest scrutiny. What a man of few habits - allegedly limited to Whitechapel and the Diogenes - was doing in my humble flat was quite beyond me, and I’m sure my astonishment showed rather plainly across my map for anyone to see, let alone the brother of the famed detective.

It didn’t stop me from uttering a cheery, “What ho!”

“Mr. Wooster, I presume,” Mr. Holmes said at last, and then added a bit perfunctorily - if that’s the word I mean - “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“Rather! I mean, the pleasure’s certainly all mine. What brings you to the old Wooster abode?”

“I would just like a word with Mr. Jeeves, if you have no objections.”

“Right-o!” I exclaimed, or at least I began to, before Jeeves cut in with one of his quiet sheep-like coughs.

“If I may, sir?” Jeeves said, giving every indication that he would say his piece whether I granted him the leave to do so or not.

“Go ahead, Jeeves,” I said, having no intention of stopping the chap - after all, it was with him that Mr. Holmes wanted to speak. I felt fortunate enough to be a bystander and get to meet the fellow, not that said fellow seemed entirely keen on meeting me.

“My apologies, Mr. Holmes,” Jeeves said, “but I must refuse. My duty is to Mr. Wooster.”

“Jeeves, I ask that you reconsider,” Mr. Holmes said with some impatience. “If things continue as they are going, not even Mr. Wooster will be safe.”

“I say! What’s going on?” I exclaimed.

“War is brewing, Mr. Wooster,” Mr. Holmes said without taking his eyes off of Jeeves, “Even now, I fear it is too late to do anything more than delay the inevitable, and, perhaps, to weaken the blow when it falls. Our only hope is to end it quickly and without too much bloodshed.”

“You speak as though there’s a war already on! Some trouble in the colonies, what?”

“In the colonies, no, nothing out of the ordinary. It is Europe that is barrelling toward war at an alarming pace. It is only with the service of men like Mr. Jeeves that we have a chance of diffusing the situation before it is too late.”

“Now see here!” I exclaimed. “Jeeves is a remarkable chap with a first-rate brain who eats loads of fish, but stopping a war, that’s a bit thick, even for him.”

“I do not expect him to do so single-handed,” Mr. Holmes said with more than a bit of impatience. He was about to say more, but Jeeves beat him to it.

“Thank you, Mr. Holmes, but I believe I have made my position clear.”

“I beg you to reconsider,” Mr. Holmes said, though it sounded rather more like a demand to me.

Jeeves, however, stood firm.

“I will call again after you have had some time to give it further consideration.” There was something dire in Mr. Holmes’s tone, almost like a threat.

“I am afraid you would find it to be a waste of effort,” Jeeves said, implacable. “My answer will be no different.”

“I will call again in a week,” Mr. Holmes said as though he had not heard a word of what Jeeves had said. “Good day, Jeeves, Mr. Wooster.” And with that, he took his leave.

I fell back on the sofa as Jeeves saw the chap out, feeling rather like a lion had blown through the place and left all asunder. I’d hardly heard the door shut behind him when a glass materialized in hand.

“War, Jeeves?” I said after taking a sip and giving it a thoughtful swish.

Jeeves seemed not to hear the question; one of the chap’s few failings, and I knew it wasn’t a matter of being hard of hearing. “If I may take the liberty of suggesting it, sir, New York is very pleasant this time of year.”

I checked the fellow instanter. “What’s all this rot about New York all of a sudden, Jeeves?”

“Only that you may find it a pleasant diversion, sir.”

I hadn’t known Jeeves for more than a decade and not picked up a thing or two. “You mean to keep me out of England?”

“I believe it may be the best course of action, sir.”

“Then you think it’s serious? All that Mycroft Holmes was saying about war in Europe and horrible bloodshed and all that?”

“It is only a possibility, sir.”

I gave my glass a pensive swirl. “It is a rather hard thing to believe, war and all at a time like this, but Mr. Holmes wouldn’t come all this way if it wasn’t dire, what?”

Jeeves has a way of dodging around a question if he doesn’t want to answer it, all with the utmost propriety, as though he has no choice but to hold his tongue, not that it stops him when he has something he means to say. Upon this occasion he was at his most slippery.

“Jeeves” - I fixed the man with my gaze in an attempt to get a hold on him - “are you suggesting that at a time when, if Mr. Holmes is right, any decent fellow ought to rally round for King and country, we skip across the pond, leaving it all high and dry?”

The chap was looking distinctly soupy, troubled, I’d call it, as much as Jeeves is ever troubled by anything. He seemed about on the verge of giving Bertram Wooster the old cold shoulder, but just managed to wrangle down the impulse at the last minute.

“Out with it, Jeeves,” I declared, every inch the affronted aristocrat.

At last Jeeves said, “I believe that would be advisable, sir.”

“I don’t believe this, Jeeves! Cutting and running like this, it isn’t like you. When I’m in the soup, you’ve never balked, no matter how deep the tureen has gotten, shouldn’t it be the same for jolly old England?”

“I beg to differ, sir.”

“You disagree, Jeeves?”

“Sir, this is hardly a matter of being in the soup, if I may use the expression,” Jeeves said severely.

“I can’t think of soupier.”

“If I may take the liberty of saying so, sir, to call the matter ‘soupy’ is something of an understatement.”

I waved off the particulars.

“Sir, I fear Mr. Holmes is not prone to exaggeration. If you remain in England I expect you will be in grave danger.”

“Jeeves, my ancestors didn’t fight at Agincourt for their descendants to run at the slightest suggestion of danger!”

“That may be so, sir, but nor would they, I expect, desire such an abrupt end to the Wooster line, as will no doubt ensue if you remain.”

“Jeeves!” I exclaimed in protest at the man’s sharp tone if nothing else.

But it didn’t take Jeeves’s fish-fed brain to see what was really going on.

I let out a bit of a sigh and waved the chap over to join me on the sofa, where we often sit side-by-side, reading or just chewing the fat as the case may be. He obliged me readily enough, but there was no answering upward twitch of his lips, and nor did I really expect one under the circs. I turned to face him with a serious visage.

“A drink?” I suggested abruptly, in half a bid to stall, though I didn’t doubt the chap could use one.

But his response was in the negative. “No thank you, sir.”

“Very well, Jeeves,” I said and sipped my own instead. After a bit, I asked, “Aren’t there some things worth fighting for?”

I regretted the words as soon as they left my mouth. They were Jeeves’s own and here I was using them against him. The man recoiled a little even as I said it - he hardly moved at all, but I could just about feel the distance opening up between us. I made to reach out for him, but faltered about halfway there and let my hand fall back.

“Yes, sir,” Jeeves said, his voice low and dashed intense.

I peered into the man’s eyes. Another chap’s e. may have provided a window to the soul, as they say, but Jeeves’s e. were nothing but infinite dark, betraying nothing, and only serving to accentuate the rummy intensity of his tone.

“Your life is worth fighting for, sir,” he continued.

“But dash it all, Jeeves! There are things worth risking life and limb for, aren’t there?” I exclaimed. “What about King and country and all that?”

“If you will pardon my saying it, sir, I expect your involvement in such a war will make little difference either way.”

It stung to hear it, but I couldn’t deny the truth in his words. Still, I had to protest, “But Jeeves, it’s still a duty one must bear, what?”

“No, sir.”

But I wasn’t done yet - “And what about you Jeeves? I know there’s not much a chap like me can do, but Mr. Holmes said you could turn around the war, and I certainly couldn’t let you go and fight without doing my share, however small it may be.”

“As I informed Mr. Holmes, I have no intention of fighting his war. My duty is to you, Mr. Wooster.”

“Jeeves,” I attempted a final word of protest, but I could feel my resolve slipping.

“Yes, sir?” Jeeves said. I couldn’t help but notice a bit of the edge had been smoothed out of his voice, though it was far from gone.

I boldly forged on. “You know it wouldn’t be so bad as all that - if something did happen to me, I mean, you’d be all accounted for and what not. You could spend your days shrimping in that little village, or travelling the world, or whatever you liked.”

“Sir!” Jeeves said sharply, his protest even more vehement than I had expected.

“All right, Jeeves,” I said, resigned. “America it is.”

If Jeeves had been any other chap, I don’t doubt his hands would have been shaking with how keyed up he was - the old stuffed frog wasn’t fooling me. As it was, they were awfully stiff as I took his h. gingerly in mine, and his dark eyes had a sort of wary, hunted look to them.

He seemed to make a visible effort to relax, drawing in a steadying breath, so quiet I hardly heard it, but I could tell that in there he was still fighting.

“I say, a spot to drink, what?” I offered again.

This time he accepted with a shallow nod. “Thank you, sir.”

I lit his cigarette too for good measure, and then leaned back against his broad shoulder. To my surprise, his arm came to rest around my waist, as though to keep me by his side. Not that the chap needed to worry; he very well knows that I wouldn’t get very far without him.

**Author's Note:**

> Wooster meets Sherlock Holmes in [Jeeves and the Great Detective](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27180496), and Dr. Watson makes an appearance in [Jeeves Gets Sick](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26798197) and [Jeeves Meets the Phantom of the Opera](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27307516).


End file.
